The Situation

CHEP is the leading provider of pallet, container, and crate pooling services for the world’s largest supply chains. The company provides tailored solutions to meet the unique business requirements of customers across multiple domains: Aerospace, Automotive, Chemical, Consumer Goods, Fresh Food, and Manufacturing. A member of the Brambles Group, which provides pooling solutions across 54 countries, CHEP strives to bring strategic value by procuring products and services efficiently, ethically, and with quality, through the use of strategic partnerships.

In order to track movement of its assets, CHEP currently uses an online tracking tool based on SAP Portal technology. With this tool, every time a transaction is initiated, CHEP’s customers would need to login to one of the systems (online or offline) and ‘submit’ the transaction. For CHEP, capturing these transactions in a timely manner is paramount, along with knowledge of the whereabouts of each asset. This information helps the company and its customers to accurately calculate fee payments.

In order to increase efficiency and optimize revenue opportunities, CHEP decided to explore asset management strategies by building a cross-platform mobile application.

The Solution

Working with Capgemini, CHEP leveraged mobile technology and smart fulfilment models to improve the end-to-end customer experience. Capgemini built the mobile application end-to-end using Software AG mobile suite, which provides a cross-platform development environment. Software AG also provided an online Mobile Device Management solution, Appfresh, which was used for device management and application deployment.

The mobile application allows users to track CHEP assets through the creation of transactions and track their statuses. The mobile application, built for iOS and Android platforms using iPhone, iPad, HTC, and Samsung devices, works in an offline–online manner. In the absence of a mobile network, the application allows users to feed transaction data, and when mobile connectivity is available, transactions are synced with the network.

The Result

The initial trials have provided CHEP with visibility into asset transactions as and when they occur – in real-time. Users, both within and outside CHEP, now have a user-friendly tool that helps them track and monitor assets. The mobile application pilot has opened up an entire window of opportunity for CHEP in their pursuit to simplify their current critical and complex activities in their supply chain lifecycle. This gives the business greater visibility and insight, enabling them to make better decisions, and cultivates satisfaction and customer loyalty while optimizing revenue opportunities.